


Devil

by DDDohyesiam



Category: LOONA (Korea Band)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, Electrokinetic Yves, F/F, Government Conspiracy, Investigations, Missing Persons, Mystery, On the Run, Shapeshifter Olivia Hye, Slow Burn, Team as Family, others will be revealed as it goes
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-20
Updated: 2020-02-27
Packaged: 2021-02-28 05:07:41
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,806
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22818244
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DDDohyesiam/pseuds/DDDohyesiam
Summary: "It's against the law.""Exactly. Ever since it was outlawed in Korea, the government told the world that the breed was dying out. But if that's true, what are you and I then?"Hyejoo was silent."13 kids from 1997.""What?""There are 13 kids born in 1997 that went missing like us."
Relationships: Jeon Heejin/Kim Hyunjin, Park Chaewon | Go Won/Son Hyejoo | Olivia Hye
Comments: 9
Kudos: 61





	1. Preview

It all started on New Years Eve.

December 31st 2017.

If Hyejoo was being honest it actually started a few months before, around her 16th birthday. It began as a simple fever, but it was one she couldn’t kick. She didn’t go to school for a week because of how terrible she felt. It was like the rest of her body had given up except her heart. She existed, but she felt like she was barely alive. 

She hadn’t gotten sick like that ever in her life.

Eventually she got better and the fever lifted she went back to school. But some things were never the same, like food never went back to tasting as good as it did before. And on most days she woke up with a pain in some part of her body. 

Even more strange were the dreams she began having, of blood lust and violence. In those dreams she was chased, or she was chasing something. But she was never herself, the body she inhabited was something more primal and less in her control. More than once she awoke screaming, self inflicted claw marks all over her body, no matter how short she cut her nails. 

She hid the marks under thick layers of clothing, and while she easily marked her own skin, nothing else did. There was the curious case of the knife she had been using to cut up potatoes, that had slipped come down straight upon her finger, except it left no mark and did not pierce the skin. Another time she had collided hard into someone turning a corner in the hall, yet the impact had not moved her an inch. The other person could only stare in shock from their position on the ground they had been knocked back into.

As the days passed she swore that the tips of her teeth grew sharper. So sharp that she began to cut her tongue on them. Mouth filling with blood in the middle of conversations. 

School became harder to sit through, like a thick fog was being pumped into her brain that didn’t allow her to think. Letters became jumbled when she tried to read them. Math past multiplication failed to reach even surface levels of understanding in her brain. 

She stopped feeling cold, even when it was freezing outside. In fact sometimes she was so hot she’d start sweating. Which won her curious glances and judgmental stares. But she couldn't take off the layers, she couldn't.

Her temper flared more often, and more dangerously. To the point that her social life suffered, and she no longer had the desire to even spend time around her friends. She spent her days at school alone, and she isolated herself from her family. She didn't want to hurt anyone.

She thought she was going crazy.

But winter break was good to her. It was like a weight was lifted off, and for the first week she was happier than she had been for a long time. 

It was like a dream really, because for the first time in a while she finally felt like herself.

But like all dreams, it was one she was forced to wake up from. 

She had woken up early that day. She cleaned her room. Helped her Mother prepare the food for the party later. She played with her cousins when they had arrived. Greeted every aunt and uncle that stepped through the door. 

But as the night went on, she regressed. She started to get a strange feeling in the tips of her fingers, and her bones creaked and moaned with every movement. 

Her cousin noticed her strange behavior, and he asked if she was okay.

Before she could respond, every hair on her body stood straight up. 

She left her family and rushed to her room. Turning off the lights and wrapping a pillow around her head to block sound, with any stimulation overwhelming her senses.

She curled up into a ball on her bed. 

She tried to hug herself, but with every movement every muscle in her body ached painfully. 

And so she lied on her bed paralyzed. 

Her blood felt hot underneath her skin; she could feel it rush through her veins and be pumped out by her racing heart. 

She started sweating, soaking through every layer of clothing, through her sheets. 

All she could hear was her own breathing.

All she could feel was herself shivering even though she felt like she was being boiled alive. 

When she forced her eyes open she saw the bright red numbers of her alarm clock.

**11:59 PM**

She had to shut them again at midnight. When she could no longer hold back her screams. Screams that were drowned out by the fireworks, cheering, and music.

She doesn’t remember when she stopped screaming. She doesn’t remember the searing white hot pain as her bones stretched. 

She doesn’t remember much of anything about the first transformation. 

All that she remembers is the pure terror she felt when she looked at herself in the mirror, and saw a pair of bright yellow wolfish eyes staring back at her.

  
And now, exactly a year later, she stares at those exact same numbers.

**11:59 PM**

Except this time they’re black, and she’s not laying on her bed feeling like she’s dying. Instead she’s sitting in a 2006 corolla, parked in a lot she’s probably going to sleep in tonight. 

She doesn’t have her family outside the walls, celebrating like there’s nothing wrong. She has someone she met only this year next to her, searching for a stream of the countdown on Youtube for the both of them to watch.

She’s no longer afraid either. Instead she sighs with resignation, because she knows. 

There’s a lot that might happen to her this year.

She might disappear this year. She might lose the girl that saved her, that sits next to her right now. She might get arrested. Hell, she might even die. 

But that became her reality a year ago, and she’s come to accept it. 

Now all she can do is fight against it. 

“Aha! I’ve got it, c’mon Oli let’s countdown.” Sooyoung scooted closer to her, holding up her phone for the both of them to see. 

Olivia bumps Sooyoung’s head with her own. 

**10**

Sooyoung slaps her arm in return. 

**9**

Olivia bumps her shoulder again and makes her drop her phone. 

**8**

“Aish Hyejoo!” Sooyoung scrambles to pick it up. 

**7**

**6**

“It’s Olivia now!” 

**5**

Sooyoung gets up again and she sends Olivia a dirty look.

**4**

Olivia laughs.

**3**

She’s glad she’s with Sooyoung right now.

**2**

But she won’t tell her that. 

**1**

“HAPPY NEW YEARS!”

She sighs once more when she feels Sooyoung's strong arms wrap around her. And while she lets out a few noises of displeasure she returns the hug just as tightly. As tight as she would've hugged her mother or father. As tight as she could hug the only family she really had left, the only family she could come home to anymore.

Because her other family was taken from her. And in that tender moment, she once more felt the bitter hatred that had led her here.


	2. January 1st.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I work pacific time. So this is still technically updated on the 27th :P

**“HAPPY NEW YEARS!”**

Olivia and Sooyoung hug tightly for a few more moments, listening to the sounds of cheering and celebrating coming from the phone besides them. Eventually Sooyoung pulls away. 

“Wait right here.” Sooyoung winks and gets out of the car. 

“‘Kay.” 

Olivia watches a few people walk out of the convenience store they’re parked near. Carrying brown paper bags, she wonders if they know they missed the countdown. 

She grabs the phone and stops the live stream, turning it off.

Sooyoung opens the door, hiding one arm behind her back. She sits sideways on the seat, a toothy grin on her face.

“What’s this?” 

“Ah well.” Sooyoung tips her head. “You remember how we didn’t get to celebrate your birthday…” 

“Ah yes. I vividly remember being chased through the streets of Daegu.” 

“And then Christmas was a no go..” 

“We certainly didn’t get to do much celebrating in that big dumpster in Gwangju.”

“I certainly could have planned that better.”

“Yeah.” Olivia rolls her eyes, hiding a smile that threatened to show at the memory of a scandalized Sooyoung being forced to hide among garbage.

“Well!” Sooyoung brings out her hand from behind her back to reveal a Choco pie, with a single birthday candle stuck in the middle. “We can celebrate right now!” 

Olivia grimaces. “Two months late, but better late than never.”

“That’s the spirit!” Sooyoung pinches the end of the candle and with a spark she lights it. She hands it to Olivia who takes it with both hands. 

Olivia stares into the tiny flickering flame in front of her. 

“You better use your wish for something good. We need all the luck we can get.” 

Olivia knits her eyebrows together in a faux serious expression. “May Sooyoung go bald this year.” Before Sooyoung can protest Olivia blows the candle out. 

Sooyoung lunges for her over the seat between them. “Son Hyejoo! Take that back!”

"Olivia hye!" She protests.

Sooyoung almost knocks the Choco pie out of her hand, and Olivia has to dive for it. Their wrestling soon turns to a lighthearted argument and eventually, quiet conversation. Sooyoung eventually passes out though. When she does, Olivia gets to enjoy her Choco pie in silence, which she had found out earlier Sooyoung got from an old lady on the street that thought they were homeless. 

She technically wasn't wrong.

She looks over at her friend. Sooyoung sleeps clutching her head, no doubt to keep her hair from falling out due to Olivia’s wish. The thought made her chuckle. 

She didn’t tell Sooyoung she had made her real wish on her actual birthday in Daegu with a match, and she definitely won’t tell her what she wished for. 

Not any time soon anyways. 

Olivia stays in her head for a while. Recounting all that’s happened in the last year, and even in just these past few months. But what’s ahead is what keeps her awake.

Tomorrow they'll arrive at Gochang. To investigate the disappearance of a girl named Im Yeojin, and hopefully find some connection to the mess they had found themselves in the moment their powers had shown. She doesn’t remember many details, just that it was recent. That Haseul’s news station had been informed to not report on it. That her family had begged to be put on air, and denied at every opportunity. 

But most of all she remembers the girl’s sweet face in a photo Sooyoung had showed her. 

That girl had disappeared into thin air. And Olivia probably would’ve too. But she has a chance to find out what happens, and she can’t do that if she doesn’t sleep. 

So she shuts her eyes and forces sleep. 

Her sleep is light, it always is in cars. Even in the deepest stage of sleep, she feels a hyper awareness of her surroundings, of the sounds outside and of the world waking up before her. In her sleep she feels the sunlight warm her face, and the body next to her stir. 

What fully brings her back to reality is a flick to her forehead. She sits up and rubs her forehead with a grunt. She sends Sooyoung a dirty look. But she’s distracted by a dull pain behind her eyes, rubbing at them for some relief but feels none. 

Sooyoung ignores her, focusing on typing on her phone. “Go brush your teeth. We gotta get moving. Lots of Magpies nearby apparently.” 

“Who told you that?” 

“Haseul said something happened in a town nearby, and they called in a troop.”

“You called Haseul this morning?” 

“Yeah. Jinsoul’s hungover.” Sooyoung smiles to herself. “Do you want to see the drunk photos she texted me?”

“Out of respect for her. No.” She responds over her shoulder as she gets out of the car. 

The cold air of the morning hits her. But she only knows it's cold because she can see her breath. That was at least one thing she liked about all this, she never got cold anymore. 

Instead of cold, the air felt refreshing, so she rolled up the sleeves of her grey long sleeve and staggered towards the trunk of the car. Movements hindered by the fatigue of sleep.

The trunk held all the belongings they had left. Which in Olivia’s case was a few articles of clothing, a notebook, and a picture of her family, all packed securely in a black backpack.

She quickly grabs her toothbrush and heads towards the edge of the lot. 

They had only driven an hour or so last night away from the last city they were in. However, it was enough ground to cover, as they had escaped urban sprawl, and were surrounded by the rural offerings of Korea's countryside. 

She brushes her teeth facing the treeline, sparing any passing by cars from the experience of watching her spit. She still had an audience however. A scruffy homeless man squatting a few feet away watches her silently. 

He has long grey matted hair, and a thick beard that covers his neck. He was bundled so tightly, wearing layers upon layers of worn out clothing. He watched her strangely, fixated on her almost in awe, until a dawn of recognition, and then his face was twisted up in disgust.

Olivia glares at him multiple times, but he doesn’t take the hint and keeps on staring. 

“Hello?” She asks, annoyed. “Do you want some or what?” She lifts up the toothpaste in her hand.

The man is silent. His beady eyes examining her. He looks away and shakes his head. “There used to be so many of you.”

Her annoyance dies out. She feels goosebumps emerge all over her body. She quickly scans around to see if anyone is near enough to hear them. “What’d you just say?”

“It’s just you and me kid, but don’t think that makes you any safe.” He said in a gravely voice.

Olivia tries to step menacingly towards him, but he seems to scoff at her as she does. 

“Shut up.” Her voice cracking as she says it.

He sneers at her, showing off an array of twisted yellow teeth. “Don’t worry child. I won’t say a word. I don’t need to. They’ll catch you soon enough.”

She stiffens at his words. She doesn’t know what to do. She clenches her fist and takes a breath but before she can do anything Sooyoung calls her from across the lot. 

“Olivia let’s go! We gotta hit the road!” 

She stiffly turns away from the man and walks away without another word. When she’s across the lot and entering the car she hears him speak once again.

“It’s your eyes.” 

Her stomach drops. But her insides twist more violently at the realization, that he knew she would hear him.

Sooyoung starts the car, completely unaware of what had just occurred. She hummed to herself and drove back onto the street towards where they’re headed.

Olivia immediately brings down the sun visor to examine herself. She doesn’t have to look hard because in the mirror she instantly sees what the old man was talking about. The usual charcoal of her eyes had melted, flickering between dark brown and a reddish orange glow.

Olivia sucks in her breath. 

Sooyoung jumps at the sudden sound. “Hey, are you alright?” She looks around nervously.

Olivia groans into her hands, massaging her eyes. She can feel them pulsating behind her fingers, the dull ache still there. “I’m so stupid.” 

“Hey seriously. What’s going on?”

Olivia doesn’t answer, only slowly lifting up her head so Sooyoung could see. She makes eye contact with Sooyoung and the girl swerves the car in surprise.

“Oh fuck.” She quickly regains control of the car. Before turning back towards her. “Did anyone see you?” 

Olivia scoffs at the memory. How had she not noticed she was shifting right in front of him. “Just some old homeless guy while I was brushing my teeth. He totally called me out too. And I was shitting my pants because I thought he could tell just from my human form.” 

Sooyoung hums. “I see.”

Olivia chews her lip. “So do we have to kill him?”

Sooyoung swerves once again. This time, the car behind her honks at her and the driver decides to pass her, flipping her off as he does.   
Sooyoung doesn’t pay attention to him though, instead focusing amused glance at Olivia. “No! What the hell! We can’t kill every homeless man that accuses us of crap. There wouldn’t be any homeless men left if we did.” 

Olivia doesn’t catch onto her amusement however. She remains fixated on her eyes in the mirror, still shifting in color. If they had been in a big city and this had happened, they’d have the entire Keeper force after them, and their trail would be hot for weeks. She wonders what Sooyoung got out of keeping her around.

Sooyoung softens when she notices Olivia’s inner turmoil. The usually blunt and standoffish girl had not a single air of either qualities at the moment. 

“Hey.” She pushes Olivia’s shoulder, keeping her eyes on the road. “I know that was scary, but we won’t see him ever again. The worst he can do is point and say ‘they went that way’.”

“Actually.” The girl responded in a small voice. “He said he wouldn’t tell.”

“Ah, perfect.” Sooyoung smiled. “Then he just wanted to fuck with you. He probably says that to every kid that brushes their teeth in the bushes of a gas station.”

“Well he did see my eyes.”

“He was probably surprised about being right. And, if you think about it he was helping you.” 

“Huh?”

“He pointed it out so you would notice. Probably so you would stop doing it, and if he keeps to his word and doesn’t snitch, all he did was help you hide it.” 

Olivia remained pensive. She was fine with letting the conversation go at that moment, preferring silence to continue brooding.

But Sooyoung had other plans.

“Hey Oli.”

“What.”

“When was the last time you transformed?”

Olivia closed her eyes. She was hoping Sooyoung wouldn’t ask that. If she was being honest, almost a month. “Three weeks.”

“Tsk tsk.” 

“I know I know.” 

Olivia frowns. She can hear Sooyoung’s voice from months ago echo in her mind. _You have to let it out regularly, or it’ll build up, and then you can’t control it._

Sooyoung opens her mouth to speak, but she catches herself. She purses her lips. “Alright, I won’t lecture you. But I’m going to stop the car, and we’re going to hike out.”

“No. That’s not necessary.” 

She was feeling a mixture of things: annoyance, discomfort, fatigue. Transforming took a lot out of her. And she got out of it for a few weeks, Sooyoung being preoccupied with keeping them on the run, but she couldn’t escape it. 

“Yes it is.” 

She stares out the window. Already feeling the strain on her muscles that comes with transforming. 

“I don’t want to.” She knew she sounded childish, but she didn’t really want to say anything else.

“You don’t want to because you never do it! So you aren’t getting any better at it.” 

“I’m not getting any better?” 

“I mean.” Sooyoung stutters. “Like, the flow. It doesn’t happen easy. You’re getting more dog-wolf like. But it’s not applicable in the moment. Like in a fight. Fuck, you know what I’m saying.” 

Sooyoung basically calling her incompetent didn’t soothe her annoyance. 

“I’m good in a fight. I’m still strong.” She protests. 

“Yeah you are. But they pack those keepers full of crap so they’re strong too. But with powers? They’re nothing.” Sooyoung’s almost boastful when she says it. 

Olivia fills with envy at the memory of the few times she’s seen Sooyoung’s powers truly at work. 

Her voice was low, like a threat, masking any emotion that threatened to spill forth.“You don’t get it Sooyoung. Your power doesn’t hurt you.” _That’s why you’re so good at it._

“Listen here teen wolf.”

Olivia rolls her eyes. Sooyoung loves making references to fictional werewolves and it drives her insane. 

“We’re about to meet some very old people. And one thing old people are great at doing is dying, and they would absolutely die if they saw one of your transformations. No offense but that shit is horrifying.”

Sooyoung hadn't informed her about the old people but she didn't dwell on it. She went into most things blind anyways. Her thoughts were more preoccupied with the burden of transforming. “I just hate it. I hate it.” 

“I know you do. But we have no choice. You hold it in, it happens anyways. The only difference is control.” Sooyoung pulls over. The road passed right through a forest, and they hadn’t seen another car in quite some time. She parks, and then fully faces her. “That’s because you don’t do it enough. Last time I talked to Jinsoul she told me she met up with someone like you.”

Olivia raises a brow.

“He’s some kinda rat dude, been hiding for a while. He said you just have to do it a lot till you don’t feel it, and it’s effortless. Like second nature.” 

“I just have to do it a lot. And how many times is that?” Hundreds. Thousands. Olivia felt a little sick.

Sooyoung’s eyebrows knit together, and the amount of concern on her face only makes Olivia feel worse. “I wish I could be more help. But Jinsoul’s researching and gathering information every day, and we made good progress before, so just hold on. A little longer.” 

Olivia looks down, she picks at her jeans. Everything to avoid what she knew she had to do. 

“You and me versus the world, remember?” 

Sooyoung’s voice finally breaks her out of her brooding spell. It was unfair for her to use those words, but they warmed Olivia nonetheless. Words that are burned into her memory. Sooyoung was looking at her a similar way the first time she had said that, and a simple jogging of the memory was enough to convince her.

Olivia takes in a deep breath and concedes. “Alright. Fuck it, alright.”

Sooyoung quirks a brow at her. “Alright?”

Olivia shakes the numbness out of her fingers. “Yeah. What good am I if I can’t transform anyways.” The last thing she was going to be was a burden.

“Like you said, you’re plenty strong, but your wolf form is terrifying. If we’re gonna win this, we need it.” 

_If we win this. We._

Sooyoung opens the car door and Olivia does the same. 

They exit the car, taking their backpacks from the trunk. That was the good thing about having nothing, as they walked through the forest, they carried everything they owned on their backs. 

Olivia feels the crunch of the forest floor underneath her feet as they walk deeper into the pine trees. The deep earthy smell and the clean air does well to clear her nerves. 

“Hey.” Sooyoung speaks up again. “You’re out of practice. And you probably think it’s gonna hurt more than normal. So turn into a small one. Don’t go full Van Helsing. The pup form is easy for you right? We mastered that one before we had to leave. Just turn into a little mutt for a few minutes, just so you don’t lose control later.” 

“Yeah. Okay.” Olivia looks around, and they are almost completely alone. Only a few birds to witness what was about to happen.

“It’s small, so less stretching right?”

“Just a couple of joint pops.” Olivia rolls her shoulders to warm them up.

“Nothing you can’t handle.” Sooyoung looks back at her over her shoulder. 

They continue walking in silence, traversing deeper into a forest that seems to wrap around them. Her thoughts couldn’t help but wander back to the night of her first transformation. The kind that she had only tried to replicate once, an experience that almost killed her. 

The her she had seen in the mirror that night was about the worst thing she had ever seen. 

Sooyoung stops at a clearing, an area where the trees seemed to grow slightly more sparse. 

“Here.” 

Olivia forces away the memory of her first transformation. That, half human half wolf monstrosity isn’t what she’s doing right now. She’ll avoid that as long as she can. 

“We’ve done this plenty of times. And remember, if it gets out of hand I’ll knock you out.” 

Olivia nods. She stands in the center of the clearing, and takes a deep breath, and then another. Closing her eyes she focuses on her breathing. These moments before a transformation are when she’s hyper aware of every sensation, every bone, every muscle in her body. She feels her blood circulate, and her heart pump. 

She slowly tenses every muscle, like she’s curling in on herself. She feels the raw power build up, and she slows. She finally gets low to the ground, and her instincts do the rest.

She wants to scream when her bones start to shift, but before she can she cracks one eye open and sees Sooyoung flinch when one of her bones cracks. She bites her lip to keep from crying out. 

But she remembers the past transformations, and goes through the steps. She focuses on her breathing, she pictures the correct form, she tenses, and slows the transformation, controlling it. 

_“Won’t slowing it down make it hurt more?” She had asked._

_The pale moonlight illuminated Sooyoung’s serious expression. “You have to slow it down because that means you’re controlling it. The point of practicing a transformation is gaining control over it.”_

_It was the opposite of what she had been doing. Before she had tried to rush it, get it out of the way, and spend as little time as she could on it._

_“Do it again.” Sooyoung said. “Slower.”_

_“Slower.”_

“Slower.” 

That same voice brought her back to the present. And she grit her teeth as they sharpened, and drew them out one by one. 

She lost track of time. Halfway through she had felt exhausted, and almost gave up. 

She was gasping as she stared at her hands in front of her. But they weren’t quite hands anymore. They had curled in on themselves, and molded into a poor imitation of a paw. 

In the limbo, the in-between human and wolf, was the most painful part of the transformation.

She could give up right now. Call it quits. Be happy with getting this far. She had avoided transforming for quite a while. It was normal for her to be rusty. She could handle another failed transformation, it wasn’t her first. 

But for some reason, in the midst of her rationalization of her failure, a face entered her thoughts. It painted over every excuse, it covered up every justification. 

The face of Im Yeojin haunted her at that moment, and it didn’t allow her to let go.

So she forced herself through it. 

She didn’t quite realize when it was done either. She had transformed so slowly, she couldn’t recognize where she began and the wolf ended. 

She only knew it was adequate when Sooyoung began clapping. If Sooyoung thinks it’s the end then it must be. 

So Olivia collapses onto the ground. 

On the ground she’s panting, and savoring the absence of pain. Even her eyes feel better and the soreness of her body was nothing compared to what she had felt moments before. On the ground she takes in the sounds of the forest, the birds chirping, the deer trotting 6 miles away. She can smell the boars a couple of miles away from them, and the flowers growing nearby. 

The enhanced senses of a wolf almost make her feel high.

Sooyoung appears in her blurry vision, standing over her. She must look happy because Sooyoung smiles at her, and she looks relieved. She kneels down to sit beside her. 

“That was the longest you’ve managed to push it.” She sounds almost in disbelief. “And this is also the biggest you’ve managed to ever get.” 

Sooyoung gets to her feet. “Come on get up. Let me measure you.” 

Olivia stands up gingerly, stretching each leg first. She's surprised to notice she’s higher off the ground than usual. She tries to speak but a low rumble comes out of her throat instead. _Measuring tape_.

But Sooyoung seems to read her thoughts as she wordlessly pulls out the yellow tape they use to keep track of her progress. 

Olivia stands still. Sooyoung carefully measures the length of her body, her height off the ground, and takes a photo with her instant film camera. After Sooyoung’s done Olivia is almost shaking in anticipation. 

“Whew!” Sooyoung writes in the journal in red pen. “2.6 feet tall. We are out of black dog territory and in big fucking wolf territory.” 

A mixture of intense relief and happiness fills her and she wants to run around but feels she doesn’t have it in her. So instead she ambles over to Sooyoung and allows the girl to pet her excitedly. 

“Did you lie about not practicing?” Sooyoung jokes. “I swear, you have to have been transforming behind my back.” 

Olivia huffs in amusement. They both knew she hated transforming but she allows herself to enjoy the compliment. She watches as Sooyoung flips through the progress notebook, back to a handmade graph. On the graph she adds another point, and connects it to the previously made line. 

She holds up the notebook for Olivia to see. Sometimes she forgot the progress she had made. The first entry, of a successful transformation, had her at around 1.5 feet tall. A polaroid of a shaggy black dog, she had only seen in pictures, pasted onto the page next to it. It was an ugly dog, but the success of transforming at-will made her a little fond of that form.

Examining the data she remembers how she had hovered at 2 feet for a while. And before this had made it to a max of only 2.1 feet tall and 4 feet long. 

Sooyoung brought down the notebook. “You did really well today, you know. If you can make this much progress, through sheer force of will, then imagine after regular frickin’ practice.” 

Sooyoung has a gentle expression, but a thought crosses her mind that causes her expression to harden. “In a fight I can’t watch your back all the time. And we’ll get separated eventually. When the time comes I need you to be able to take care of yourself. That’s why I push you. If it was up to me, I wouldn’t put you through any of this. We’d be traveling magicians and work kids birthday parties.” 

Olivia wants to smile and tries to, but her effort is met with a horrified expression. 

She freezes and so does Sooyoung. Until the girl breaks out into roaring laughter. It lasts so long Sooyoung is almost crying. 

Olivia almost regrets it, but she can’t bring herself to. Instead she keeps trying to smile, and Sooyoung keeps laughing till she cries. 

It takes a few minutes for her to collect herself, wiping at the corner of her eyes. “Okay. Go do laps.”

Olivia is taken aback. She had been hoping for a ‘good job kid, go ahead and untransform’ or a ‘lets nap I’m tired’, or really anything else. 

She snarls at the girl in front of her hoping for it to be even somewhat effective but Sooyoung just pushes her away. 

“Ew, you just spit everywhere. Seriously go do laps. I need to observe your movements.” 

Olivia refuses to move and Sooyoung just pushes harder. 

“Seriously! Jinsoul gets mad if I don’t take detailed notes.” 

What finally gets her to move is when Sooyoung lifts up her hand and shoots a bolt of electricity straight at a nearby tree trunk. The sheer force of the blast, and brilliance of the light has her scrambling to run without even thinking. 

She runs for a long time and Sooyoung almost makes her run for longer. But eventually she sees the time on her watch and signals for Olivia to stop.

It’s 3 PM when she finally returns to her human form. The return back to being human is always faster, always easier. It’s like letting go of a breath you’ve been holding in for a long time. 

Her bones still shift, and grow and bend strangely. And she still feels a similar pain, but it’s always faster.

Once she’s back to normal, Sooyoung throws a towel over her, and she changes into the most comfortable clothes she can find in her bag. The clothes fit loosely over her body and she breathes a sigh of relief when she’s done. 

They walk in a comfortable silence back. It’s the moments right after a transformation that she can feel the coolness of fresh air most strongly on her skin, she relishes it. Her sore muscles slow her down, and pretty soon she’s trailing behind. 

Sooyoung notices, and forces Olivia to let her give her a piggyback ride back. They argue, but Olivia is too tired to do it for long. She relents and settles comfortably on Sooyoung’s back. Locking her arms in front of her, she rests her head on Sooyoung’s shoulder. 

Her pride can’t even fight the exhaustion she feels. She’s still muttering protests as she drifts off, leaving Sooyoung alone in the forest with only a compass to get them back to the car. 

Sooyoung doesn’t mind though.

When they get to the car Sooyoung wakes the sleepy girl up. She’s met with a couple of death threats that she shakes off, and she deposits the girl in the passenger seat. She puts everything back in the trunk, and stands in front of it for a few moments. 

She stares at the notebook in her hand. Flipping through, admiring all the tiny notes and changes since Olivia had accepted her help. She finds the first entry.

_ June 2nd.  _

_Son Hyejoo is very bad at this._

Pasted onto the next page is a polaroid photo of Olivia’s first form. A mangy, almost hairless, horrifying little dog. 

Sooyoung chuckles at the memory. She places the journal back in the trunk and closes it. Back in the driver’s seat she takes one more glance at the sleeping girl. Her heart swells with affection.

 _You’re growing soft Sooyoung_. She thinks to herself.

But she doesn’t dwell on it.

Instead she starts the car, and continues towards Gochang-gun.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> \----  
> I was debating on whether I should include transformation scenes in this story. A lot of stories I've read just skip over them, and I definitely get why. But I feel it's important to include these especially in the beginning, that Olivia's are still as emotionally taxing as they are for her. 
> 
> And this is one of her easier ones. 
> 
> Please again share your thoughts. Feedback is incredibly helpful, especially as I've never written anything like this before. 
> 
> Chapter 2 Release Date: March 5


End file.
